


there's a light in the darkness

by leopoldjamesfitz



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Hi its me again back with your monthly dose of pain
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-02
Updated: 2019-04-02
Packaged: 2019-12-31 23:37:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,029
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18324275
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leopoldjamesfitz/pseuds/leopoldjamesfitz
Summary: Stepping out onto the deck, she ignored the looks she was given. It was the same; every morning she was met with pity, apprehension, slight anger, and worry. Every morning, she stared back with apathy.“Where to, today?” She asked, not giving a second glance to anyone else in the room. She missed tea, and a good night sleep, and feeling his warmth wrapped around her like a blanket.Daisy was the first one to acknowledge her, and the first to answer her question. With a stiff smile, she pressed onto the latch of her gauntlets to lock them in place. “A small planet called Halla.” She answered, standing up and facing the other woman. “Rumor has it there’s someone there who has a lead.”It’s nothing, it’s everything, it’s something.





	there's a light in the darkness

**Author's Note:**

> Hi again!! I'm going to scream this from the rooftops - but this is obviously very AU. I wasn't at Wondercon, and I've only read a few spoilers about 6x01, but this is basically my take on those. For the record, I have no reason to believe that any of this is factual, but this is fiction. I can do what I want. This is a very very very AU version of whatever is going to happen after 6x01, and probably what happened in 6x01.
> 
> I hope you all enjoy despite this. Thank you for reading! All mistakes are mine.

Exhaustion crept up like an old friend, weeding its way through her body and threatening to swallow her whole at the first chance it got. Jemma fought it, as valiantly as she could manage, but it was getting harder.

The calendar she’d kept pinned to her bunk was like a beacon of horror. With every day that passed, and every number that she wrote, she felt further away from the dream she’d once had when they had begun this adventures.

_We joined this team for adventures and got more than we had hoped._

Jemma ran her thumb along her wedding ring, something she still wore despite it all, and pressed her hand along her heart, where his ring lay and with a soft sigh, she picked up the pen that she’d tied to dangle next to the calendar and wrote _Day 403._

The disappointment should get easier, she supposed.

Shifting out of bed, she tried not to think about how this was the longest they’d spent away from one another since they’d met. Longer than the handful of days that followed her realizing Aida had swapped out her Fitz for a duplicate, longer than the days spent in space in the future, longer than the days spent in Maveth.

And he was still nowhere to be found.

A part of her hoped that it would have been easy, that they’d find the ship and find him and everything would be okay. For once, it might feel like the universe was giving and not taking from them again and again. But the more realistic side of her knew that it would be impossible. They’d never done anything easy; why start now?

She dressed haphazardly, flattening down her bangs as best as she could and tying her hair back. It’d grown longer in the year, and was fraying at the edges. She hardly had the opportunity to care.

Another day, another mission, another failed attempt at finding him.

Perhaps if there was something more to go on. Something, anything. Enoch had only given them half answers, half truths that always ended with, “unknown.” The only reason he was still breathing was because she’d been stopped before she had the chance to strangle him. She was furious, and angry, and tired.

She was so tired.

Stepping out onto the deck, she ignored the looks she was given. It was the same; every morning she was met with pity, apprehension, slight anger, and worry. Every morning, she stared back with apathy.

“Where to, today?” She asked, not giving a second glance to anyone else in the room. She missed tea, and a good night sleep, and feeling his warmth wrapped around her like a blanket.

Daisy was the first one to acknowledge her, and the first to answer her question. With a stiff smile, she pressed onto the latch of her gauntlets to lock them in place. “A small planet called Halla.” She answered, standing up and facing the other woman. “Rumor has it there’s someone there who has a lead.”

It’s nothing, it’s everything, it’s something. She offered a small, hopeful smile, and nodded. Nobody else in the room offers her the same. She knew they were still angry with her, and she accepted it with stride.

Maybe their first, second, eighth, twentieth attempt had failed, but they would get there. They had to.

She couldn’t take ‘no’ as an answer any longer.

Before long, Davis announced that they had arrived, and she didn’t wait to move toward the exit. Daisy preferred to be first, under the thought that she was the only one of them who could easily defend the rest if they were lead astray, but Jemma hadn’t exactly been lying docile for these past few months. She’d learned enough to keep her own.

Nonetheless, the moment they’d stepped outside, Daisy was in front of her, casting her a glance that told her to watch her back. She trusted her, and despite the several arguments they’d gotten into over the months, she knew that she had her best interest in hand.

The fact that they were still here, instead of back on Earth, like Daisy had wanted, was enough. She knew her team didn’t trust her as much as they had, and knew that it would take a while to rebuild that trust, but she’d done what needed to be done. They’d had a lead.

(That had been at least three leads before, but she didn’t mention that.)

A grotesque looking creature manned the door. Standing at almost eight feet, she estimated, he looked down upon them, his face contorted into an eternal frown. “Friend or foe?” He asked simply, though not in English. His language seemed to be a slanged version of the one that she’d learned over their time in space, and she hesitated for a moment.

They’d been through the entirety of this galaxy, and met with many a different character. Some species found it rude if you spoke the proper tongue, as though you were stepping on their toes by _imposing_ the proper enunciations. While others found it rude if you tried to adapt to their cultures.

Jemma offered a slight, quick smile before replying, “friend,” in a careful tone. Her enunciation wasn’t perfect, though learning an alien language wasn’t the same as learning German, or French. There were hardly tutors on the edge of the earth. He looked upon the group with intense regard before stepping away. A small tablet-like object was in his hand, and he pressed a button. The door pushed open.

She could see the curious gazes that were being shared with her, but she didn’t pay them any attention as she stepped inside. When the door closed behind the four of them, she let out a breath that she hadn’t been aware that she was holding and dropped her shoulders. There was only one way into this place, which meant there was only one way out. She looked at Daisy, imploring Quake to sit down just this once. If they were to get out of this place in one piece, they’d need her cooperation.

Jemma looked around the room, taking in every little piece of it. The bar was mostly filled with Chronicon hunters, but there were a few species that she recognized, species that they’d interacted with in the past. Some of them friendly, and some of them not so much.

She was glad, now, that she knew which ones to stay away from.

Before she could move forward, Daisy caught her shoulder and turned her to face her. Jemma sighed, pressing her lips together, awaiting the speech, but it never came. “What’s our game plan, here, Simmons?”

Get in. Find the intel. Get out. It all seemed so simple in her head.

“What did your intel say?” She asked instead. They’ve been working close with Enoch since they’d found the empty cryochamber, though she still hadn’t been able to establish if it was because he had valuable intel to share, or if he was guilty because of what had happened. He’d been the one to lead them here, although reluctantly.

Daisy looked over in her direction, not entirely happy that she had sidestepped her question, but they would get back to that. They were far beyond the point of running into a place without having their bases covered, and even in her desperation, Jemma knew that. “We’ll meet a guy at the bar. I don’t know who he is and what he looks like, but Enoch says he’s trustworthy.”

Fitz had once trusted Enoch, too, Jemma thought bitterly, before the guilt set in. Enoch hadn’t willingly let Fitz go.

With a slight nod, she turned, seeking out the bar. It would look strange if four strangers huddled together, but it would also look suspicious if they all separated and moved to different parts. Jemma tossed a glance over her shoulder at Piper and Davis, who both offered her incredulous looks before Piper let out a deep sigh and hooked her arm around Davis’.

“We’ll be in the corner,” she advised, and dragged him off.

Jemma nodded, and looked around the room, even though in her initial look through of the area, she’d already pinpointed where the bar was. Daisy had set the coordinates and told them all, briefly, what they were looking at, so she’d known beforehand exactly what was in the cards, but a refresher never hurt.

If anything, it helped her nerves.

She exhaled and nodded, casting her friend another glance before she moved toward the bar. Daisy took a moment, but then she was following her. They didn’t sidle up together, Daisy sitting a few seats down from her, but as far as the Chronicon knew, they were meeting Quake. They weren’t meeting Quake and her friend.

Which meant Jemma had to remain as inconspicuous as possible. While simultaneously trying not to crawl out of her skin as another creature approached the bar. Nobody cast a second glance at Daisy, and that makes her anxiety creep up just that much more.

They’d set a time, but time didn’t really exist in the galaxy the same way that it existed on Earth. It was all a bit confusing, even after being among the stars for as long as they had been. They could be days early, or too late.

“Can I get you something?” A voice said to her side, and it took her a moment to come back to herself and look away from Daisy, who was staring off in the other direction. Jemma pressed her lips together, decoding the phrase from it’s native language to the one she was more comfortable with, and turned toward the person speaking, intending to decline their offer when she stopped.

The first thing she noticed about the stranger was the familiarity of the eyes. She’d know those eyes anywhere.

“Fitz,” she gasped, momentarily forgetting where she was and who she was supposed to be and spoke English. The creature next to her looked, appalled by her outburst, but turned back to their drink a moment later. “Oh, god,” she whispered, this time in the alien language she’d grown used to. The one he’d spoken to her in. “It’s you.”

He stared back at her, no hint of recognition in his gaze as he blinked a couple of times, seemingly recalibrating, and asked again, “Can I get you something?”

The coolness in his gaze broke her into tiny fragments. There was no hint of anything. He didn’t look at her as though she was anything other than just another patron. She reached across the bar, gripping his hand, and he blinked again. He was warm underneath her touch, and she thought idly about how normally he’d complain about how cold her hands were. But he said nothing.

“Fitz,” she said quietly, her voice cracking. “You have to remember me.”

He stared back, looking at her intently. He didn’t move, or react. It didn’t even look like he was breathing.

Jemma exhaled slowly, her breath wavering. Before she had a moment to say anything else, Daisy sat beside her, obviously having caught wind of the interaction. From the look on her face, she looked equal parts shocked, equal parts angry. “Jemma, I-“

“Can I get you something?” He asked, almost robotically, looking toward Daisy.

Jemma choked on a sob and clenched his wrist a little harder. He looked down and then up, confused. A man stepped up behind him and Fitz flinched back, looking up toward him. “Is there something wrong here?”

Fitz shook his head and said, “no, sir,” before moving toward the other side of the bar and leaving Daisy and Jemma alone. Jemma stared at his retreating frame.

“Fitz,” she gasped, staring at him as he operated. She’d never felt more close to him before, and yet so far away. “We have to help him.”

Daisy placed her hand on her shoulder, and even though Jemma couldn’t – wouldn’t – tear her gaze away, she could see the pointed look. “I don’t think the Chronicon Hunters would approve of you walking away with their merchandise,” she told her in a low voice.

Jemma gritted her teeth together, looking at her outstretched hand and the blank gaze that stared back. A feeling of emptiness washed over her all at once as she exhaled shakily and let go of his arm. “We can’t leave him,” she said lowly, her eyes wide. “I’m not leaving him.”

Daisy looked at her, then at Fitz, as he operated. The man that had approached him was never far behind. “Jemma,” she told her quietly. “You’re not thinking clearly. I think we’re going to have to… at least for now. Figure out what we’re going to do.”

She looked at Daisy, and then back at Fitz, her heart sinking. “I know what I’m going to do,” she urged, but Daisy didn’t look convinced.

Get Fitz. Go home. Be safe. And happy.

“He doesn’t remember us,” she argued. The point was valid, but it still felt like a knife to her heart. The blank looks he’d given her, and the longing that followed… it reminded her so much of what life had been like in the Framework. But this was no simulation. “Whatever they’ve done to him…” She couldn’t finish the sentence, and Jemma silently thanked her for that. She wasn’t sure if she wanted to hear the end of it. “Jemma, even if we could get to him, there’s no guarantees we’re getting out of this without a fight.”

Jemma remembered their last argument, the heated voices and how _angry_ she’d been that Daisy had been getting into fights, and putting them on the radar. How she’d expressed that she wished nothing more for her to stop.

But this was different. This was Fitz.

“I know,” she said calmly, and looked away. From the corner of her eye, she saw Daisy drop her gaze and sigh before she stepped away.

 

* * *

 

Jemma stayed at the bar, even when Daisy busied herself with the pool table across the room. She stayed, watching him. He’d come back every now and again, offering her a soft smile that warmed her from the inside out. Or maybe it was the alcohol he was serving her. He offered her no looks that were reminiscent of the ones that she was used to receiving from him.

If she closed her eyes, she could almost pretend that they were meeting at a bar for the first time, and that the looks he gave her were flirtatious, and that she could bring him home at the end of the night and not have to worry about it.

But when she opened them, in the low lighting, the only thing she could see was him, but it wasn’t him. She wasn’t sure what had happened, but they’d done something. The Fitz that she knew would never be this… docile.

“Refill?” He asked, cutting her out of her thoughts, gesturing to the bottle in his hand. She wasn’t quite sure what she was drinking, but it wasn’t awful. Fruity, maybe, was the closest thing she could describe it to. She nodded, smiling shyly at him. He poured the glass and their hands touched.

It was only when he turned to put the bottle down that she saw it. There was a spot, low on his neck, still crusted over with blood. Like it’d been done in a hurry. Her eyes narrowed as she focused on it, the circular pattern. It was an injection site.

“What happened?” She asked, before she could stop herself, staring at the spot. Fitz adjusted his collar and smiled before stepping away, leaving her question unanswered. Her heart sunk.

Why did he have an injection site?

She looked toward Daisy, who, despite looking like she was – dare she suggest – enjoying herself, was watching her carefully. As though she expected Simmons to jump at the next chance she got to take Fitz out of there.

But she was confused.

The man from earlier watched Fitz as he walked back, and then, for the first time in hours, he placed a hand on his shoulder and told him something that Jemma couldn’t pick out. And then Fitz was leaving from behind the bar, though he didn’t go far. He moved toward a large group, and stood in front of someone, his hands folding behind his back.

Another creature came up behind the bar, and she twisted, looking toward Daisy, but she was no longer playing the game. Fitz nodded to something that the Chronicon hunters were saying and backed away, walking toward a darkened corner. Before she could stand up and follow Fitz out, Daisy appeared in front of her. “No,” she said simply. “You’re not doing this, Simmons.” She said firmly. “We need a plan before we start shooting this place up.”

Jemma glanced between Daisy and Fitz as he disappeared from sight, faltering. She knew that Daisy was right, but it didn’t make it any easier.

The only thing she was sure of was that they needed to save him. No matter the odds.

 

* * *

 

Neither of them were on good terms when she emerged from her bunk that morning. She’d apologized to Daisy late in the evening, when they’d been too tired to argue anymore, and had offered the same to Piper and Davis, who’d been caught in the crossfire.

She wore her hair down, today, and after braiding it the night before, it fell in soft waves around her head. She hadn’t slept much the night before, tossing and turning and formulating plan after plan that all came with the same conclusion: saving Fitz would not go unnoticed. He had enough creatures with eyes on him that it would be near impossible to sneak him out. They would have to do something that, she knew, some of them weren’t exactly comfortable with.

But then there was the problem with Fitz. He didn’t recognize them, and didn’t have any reason to trust them at all. Even if they could pull together some semblance of a plan, and agree to go onto it together, it didn’t mean that he would follow them to the ends of the galaxy.

Jemma went straight to the bar that morning after they’d debriefed. They’d gotten no closer to agreeing on a solution for how they would get him out of there. Jemma had hoped that maybe one of them could hide in the shadows, and at the end of his shift, they could knock him out and take them with them. But then, there was the issue of there only being one way in and one way out.

Fitz greeted her with a customary smile, asked her if she was having the same as yesterday, and poured it up for her without another question. He left her alone after that. There was still nothing, not a spark, not a hope, but she held on.

She’d waited four hundred and four days for him, and there he was, breathing, existing, living. She wasn’t going to leave without him.

The bar was quieter than it was yesterday, there was less patrons, more of the Chronicon hunters and their slaves, but it also meant there were more eyes on the patrons.

Thankfully, it also meant that Fitz paid more attention to her.

Maybe it was the kindness in her voice, strange in the alien language that she’d learned, but gentle. Or maybe it was because there was something there, a light, or a voice, telling him that there was something about this woman that he knew. (She could only hope.)

But he would smile and joke with her, and maybe, if she ignored the stabbing pain in her chest every time she said something that should be familiar to him, he looked upon her with blank confusion.

He was cleaning a glass when she finished hers, and he looked up as the tumbler hit the table a little harsher than she’d intended. Her head was swimming, and it took her a beat longer to realize that she should slow down. Getting drunk on a mission, on whatever the hell she was drinking, would do nobody favors.

“Can I offer you a terran beverage?” He asked, taking her glass and laying it in the sink. “I think they call it ‘apple juice’.” He commented, not at all sounding like it was something he even knew to actually exist. The way his face contorted in confusion as he attempted to recite it was impossibly adorable. “I think it will help with your drinking.”

Jemma laughed, unsure of why she was – good lord, how drunk was she? – as she nodded, biting down on her lower lip. “You hate apple juice,” she commented, noticing the way his eyebrows furrowed as he poured up a glass for her and pushed it in her direction. “You used to always complain when I made you drink it when you were sick.”

“Not always,” he argued, though confusion set in the moment it came out of his mouth. Jemma sat up quickly, ignoring the way her head seemed to pound harder when she did it. She looked at him, and he looked back, blinking avidly. Before either of them had a chance to say anything, the man who stood behind Fitz came up and jabbed something in his neck. He looked over at Jemma as he did, and nodded his apologies. When the needle was removed, Fitz shifted and straightened up, blinking as whatever had been filled in that vial.

A moment later, he shifted, straightening up and facing her with a smile.

“Can I get you something to drink?” He asked politely, as though seeing her for the first time.

 

* * *

 

“They’ve done something… whatever they’re injecting him with is… it’s changing him!” She ranted as she paced back and forth through the zephyr floor. Daisy had followed her out when she’d stormed off, and although Jemma had spent most of the last few hours drinking, she’d never felt more sober in her life.

It was the first thing she’d said since she’d stepped on the zephyr and began pacing, and while Daisy had been enjoying the view (sarcasm, of course) she was relieved when Jemma finally told her whatever was going on in her head, even though it didn’t clarify anything. She’d been watching Jemma, if only to make sure no creature came up and tried to hit on her in her fragile state, but she’d missed the entire exchange that had happened before Jemma had stormed out of the Hallan bar, she’d known that it had to be something extravagant to make her friend unravel the way it had.

“What the hell are you talking about?” Daisy said finally, raising her eyebrows. She sat back in her seat and crossed her arms. “Injecting him? When? What?”

Jemma frowned, and then furrowed her eyebrows. She’d thought that she’d mentioned noticing the injection site the day before, but her head was swimming with the new information. She couldn’t remember anything they’d discussed. Running her hand over her face, she stopped pacing, though her breathing was still erratic.

“Yesterday,” she said softly. “When I was there, before he left, I noticed a spot on his neck. Needle size, dried with blood.” She told her slowly, pressing her lips together. She crossed her arms over her chest, exhaling slowly. “I thought… maybe it was a tracking device. Or something of that nature but… today…”

He remembered something. There was a moment, a glimpse, before it was gone.

And all was left was a hollowness that sat within her chest.

Jemma sighed, shaking her head. “He remembered… I know he did. And they… they took that away.”

Daisy looked at her, and as Jemma glanced over in her direction, she knew that she’d lost her almost completely. Daisy wasn’t sure what she was talking about, and Jemma couldn’t calm her errant heart down long enough to even begin to explain the whole story, but she tried.

By the end of it, Daisy wasn’t sure if she was more confused, or less. The theory that Jemma was putting out there was solid, she couldn’t argue the semantics, even if they didn’t understand what could be doing this. There was no known human chemical that would do it. No way to even try and reverse engineer it, even. There was nothing.

Only the thought that somehow, Fitz was having his memories blocked, or erased entirely, in order to be controlled by one of the Chronicon hunters. For whatever reason.

Daisy let out a stifled groan as she buried her face in her hands. It was then that Davis and Piper, having opted out of their day drinking binge, emerged from the bottom deck. They looked back and forth between them, almost hesitant to ask what they’d been talking about.

“We’re going to need to find a way to knock out the bouncer,” Daisy said, in response to Piper’s delicately asked question. She turned to Jemma, eying her carefully. “And we’re going to have to break Fitz out of there much sooner than planned.” She looked at the group expectantly. “Any ideas?”

 

* * *

 

Jemma sat at the bar. If anything, because she’d already developed an identity as a drunkard, and it wouldn’t be suspicious to see her there. Daisy was at the pool table, whipping some Hallan creature’s ass, while Piper looked on. Davis was near the other end of the bar.

From the silence, Jemma knew that nobody had found the bouncer yet. It had taken a little Vitamin Quake to get him to sleep, but it’d done the trick. They had approximately fifteen minutes before he’d wake and take them in, though, and they needed to move fast.

But Fitz hadn’t approached her, and the man behind him hadn’t left his side. Almost as though he expected something to happen. Or maybe Fitz’s outburst the day before had unsettled him some, and they were keeping a watchful eye on him.

There were approximately forty people in the room. Twenty-nine of them were Chronicon hunters, four of them were her friends, and seven of them were slaves. The odds were not in their favor. But Jemma wasn’t one to worry about the math.

The only thing that mattered was getting Fitz home safe.

Jemma pressed her lips together, and took a sip of her drink, if only for courage, and closed her eyes. She waited until she heard Daisy approach the bar, laughing at her win, and then she knew that it was time to start.

It happened fast at first. Before she had the chance to open her eyes, Daisy had the pool table on it’s belly, pinning the creatures she’d been playing with underneath. Piper and Davis were holding out guns, pointing them at different areas in the room, and when she finally opened her gaze, he was staring back at her, confused and frightened.

God, she hated that look.

Daisy took down some of the hunters as they tried to approach her as though she was merely just throwing away paper. The men stood no chance, and soon most of them knew that. But it didn’t end there. One of the creatures emerged from underneath the pool table and picked up a smaller side table, throwing it in Daisy’s direction. She immediately threw her hand up and pushed the object back toward him before the creature had a chance to run.

It was time.

Jemma jumped over the counter, looking at the man that had stood behind Fitz as he moved to lunge toward them, but Daisy had caught the movement before anything could happen, and soon the man was blasted into the concrete. He fell into a slump on the floor.

She turned toward Fitz, who looked even more disoriented and confused, and grabbed his hand. She didn’t have time to explain anything to him, but she hoped that she would get a chance when they were on the run from the planet. She doubted they’d be able to come together and find them before they would be past the next jump point.

“Hi,” she said softly, grinning quickly as she squeezed his hand. He hadn’t pulled it away from her, and she took that as a small win. “You have no reason to trust me,” she told him, because she knew it was true. “But right now, I just need you to hold on, and to run.”

 

* * *

 

Fitz slept for three days after the rescue. The moment that they’d gotten him back in their ship and began to take off, she’d swept him away and bundled him into her bunk, half afraid of whatever they had been inputted into his system would have disastrous effects.

And for the first day, his body shook; it was almost like he was going through withdrawal, though the only time that he opened his eyes and looked awake were the moments when he sat up and hurled into a bucket. Other than that, he slept, and slept.

If it weren’t for the thrumming of his pulse underneath her fingertips when she checked, she might’ve been worried, but she knew that it had been a long experience for him. They had no answers as to just how long Fitz had been under the thumb of the man who called himself The Controller, but it was long enough.

Jemma sat beside him, pushing her fingers through his hair as she brought a wet flannel to his forehead and brushed away the sweat. He hadn’t been as bad on the third day, the tiredness taking over him. She was supposed to have left hours ago, and let Daisy take over – they’d been working in shifts to take care of him since he’d collapsed moments after they’d gotten him on the ship, but she’d ended up working double shifts, or at least working until either Piper or Daisy dragged her out and forced her to sleep.

It seemed so silly, to waste any time away from him. When he woke up, she knew that he would be frightened, disoriented maybe. She wanted to be the first face that he saw, because even if whatever they’d been implanting him with had permanently done damage, he would at the very least remember her. A friendly face who had been there mere moments before Quake had shut down the Hallan bar, probably for good. A friendly face who had grabbed his hand and told him to run.

She hadn’t let herself think about what or who he might be when he woke up. She knew that, no matter the circumstances, and no matter how it came to be, she would still love him. She’d still loved the man she’d met in the Framework, the man who had been manipulated and flawed, and made to hate her, and she’d still love him. That was the simple part; the easy part.

The hard part would be if he woke up and remembered everything, and had a hole of a year in his life. When the other Fitz died, she’d been left with that same hole, and the realization that Fitz, her Fitz, the man who had frozen himself in hopes of saving them in the future, wouldn’t know everything that had happened. He wouldn’t know that he’d succeeded, and helped them save the world, because he was still on his way.

It had almost been like the opportunity to tell a story at first, but the longer they’d spent in space, and the less likely it seemed that they would find him, the more she grew forlorn about the entirety of the rescue mission, and just how he might react when she told him exactly what he had missed.

And now? If he came out of it with no memory at all, a lifetime lived that he could not longer grasp, she wasn’t sure how she could help him. But she would try. She hadn’t spent four hundred and seven days fighting for him to be by her side, and now fighting with herself as he slept, and seemingly refused to wake up, to let him slip from her fingertips.

They’d spent four hundred and three days apart, and each day since together, whether or not he realized it, and she refused to spend another day without him.

(Unless he wanted that, unless he wanted them to drop him off at the next planet, and wanted to go back home. If he chose that, if he wanted that, she would abide by his wishes. If he didn’t want to see her ever again, she’d give up everything in an instant. But she didn’t let herself think about that option – because it couldn’t be an option.)

Jemma dozed off, and jolted awake a moment later. It was only then, hovering over him, that she realized how tired she was, and how overdue she was for a breakdown. The longer she thought about him potentially waking up and not wanting to be beside her, the larger the hole in her chest felt. She clutched the flannel, watching as it shook in her hand and inhaled a shaky breath before dropping it back in the bucket she’d brought with her.

Her vision blurred, and her heart beat erratically, and before she could stop herself, she was falling apart at the seams. She struggled to catch her breath, and keep herself to a minimal level of noise, because she knew that if anyone heard her, she wouldn’t be allowed to be alone with him. They’d want to protect her, and protect her from these emotions, and as much as she appreciated the thought, the very last thing that she wanted was to be away from him.

She choked on a sob, the sound piercing in the quiet room, and held onto his hand, her other hand moving up to clasp around her mouth, hoping to catch and silence any sound that came out before anyone noticed.

In all the months that they had been searching, she’d never allowed that thought, because she’d never thought that it would be an option. In every picture, every visual she’d allowed herself to imagine, on the nights that she had missed him the most – his birthday, hers, their wedding anniversary – she’d imagined them meeting each other and running and clasping the other to their body.

She’d never imagined it happening the way that it had.

Jemma found herself unable to stop crying, her body shaking with every sob, and she sat back in her chair, afraid that her shaking would disturb him in his sleep, and she wasn’t in the best state to try and help him if he felt the need to urge. Instead, she wrapped her arms around her knees, and held them to her chest and sobbed for the first time in a long time.

It’d been different in the cryochamber, when she’d been allowed a moment – she remembered the feeling of utter disappointment; it had sat with her. But this… this was mourning. It was the same feeling that she’d felt the day Mack had told her he’d died.

And yet, he was right in front of her, alive and well. Just lacking the memories that made him the man she’d fallen in love with.

Eventually, she settled, her breath coming out unevenly, reduced to a hiccupping mess and she took the flannel to dab at her eyes. The water wasn’t half as cold as it needed to be, and she knew that her eyes would be red rimmed and puffy, and for that, she prayed that nobody would come into the room any time soon, despite how long she’d overstayed her shift.

Whomever he was, whomever he’d be, she’d love him. That wasn’t the problem.

The problem was whether or not he’d still love her.

She hadn’t felt this vulnerable, this open, since they’d dragged him out of the Framework and he’d been taken away from her again – by A.I.D.A. – and when they’d finally gotten him back, she hadn’t been sure of anything. Less of all who he was, and what the Framework had done to him. And less of all, if he still felt the same for her.

Their relationship was still new then, and while she knew exactly how she felt about him, there was something about the cold way that he’d acted in the Framework that had left her too fragile to exist. When she’d collapsed that time, though, he’d been there to hold her in the same way she was holding him.

Now, she was alone, with him asleep in the bed beside her. But he wasn’t there, not really.

Jemma dozed off again, with her knees still pressed to her chest, and her head aching, but no more than her heart did as it sat heavily in her chest.

 

* * *

 

Jemma was shaken awake about an hour later by a bit of turbulence; she imagined they’d gone through another jump point. She caught herself just before she fell onto his bed and rubbed the heels of her palms into her eye sockets until they hurt and she slumped forward.

She stared at the floor for a while, feeling exhausted. And not just physically, but emotionally, and mentally, too. Their plan had gone off without a hitch, and they’d been able to get him out. That was all that mattered, wasn’t it? He was safe, and he was with them.

Shuffling on the bed beside her caused her to sit up immediately, half afraid that he’d get up, just as he’d gone several times before, and need to urge. She reached for the bucket, preparing to offer it to him, when she looked up and met his eyes. He didn’t look frightened, or scared, just disoriented.

For a long moment, they sat there, neither of them moving. He watched her with a careful consideration, almost as though he was studying her, and then, without preamble, he asked, “can I get you something?” He asked, in that same alien language as from before.

Jemma felt the pieces of her that she was holding together crumble all at once.

Swallowing, she dipped her head, looking for the words to begin to explain to him why he was here. She didn’t want to overwhelm him, or confuse him, and nothing seemed right. All the while, she was trying not to cry in front of him, because she knew that wouldn’t do either of them any good.

Her thoughts were interrupted when she heard soft laughter to her side, and when she dared to look at him, he was smiling. She was confused for only a moment when he burst out, “I’m sorry, I had to do that.” He told her, this time in English.

She was going to kill him, she thought idly, but instead fell onto the bed, wrapping him in a hug. He met her halfway, the two of them barely held up by his position, and it wasn’t long before his arm gave out underneath them, and he fell back. She crumbled, half on top of him, and pulled away.

“I hate you,” she told him firmly, using the alien language that she’d grown used to over the months, if only to prove a point, all the while ignoring the smirk he gave her in response.

He arched his eyebrow as she shifted, pulling most of her weight off of him, and onto the bed beside him, with a slight shake of his head. “Well, that’s a shame,” he replied, using the same language to respond to her. She crinkled her nose. “Because I happen to love you.”

Jemma broke then, feeling so open in that moment, with their bodies pressed up against one another, and her hand on his heart, feeling his pulse underneath her fingertips. With a shaky smile, she relished in the words, to simple, shared a dozen times over the course of their relationship, but still so new and wonderful to hear now. “I love you,” she replied softly, the sound foreign in this language.

When her head dipped as she blinked her tears away, he pressed a kiss to her forehead, which only serve to warm her heart up more.

He pulled away and stopped, and it was only when she looked back up at him that she noticed him staring, and more specifically, what he was staring at. For on the hand that sat upon his heart, was her wedding ring. She couldn’t describe the emotions that passed through his features, or the ache that pulled through her heart. She wasn’t even sure where to start trying to explain to him just what he had missed.

“Jemma…” He sighed, pressing his lips together. His eyes were watering, a hurt that she couldn't describe.

She looked up at him, holding his gaze as she hooked her hand underneath the collar of her shirt and pulled out the chain, the simple silver band sparkling in the low light. “It’s you,” she told him quietly. “It’s always been you.”

And then, she told him everything that he’d missed, her words shaky and broken at parts, but strong and willed at others, and his hand rubbed up and down the length of her back, curiosity in his gaze, and sympathy flickering.

After she finished, he was quiet for a long moment, and hesitantly, he lifted the hand that had been laying on her side and hooked his finger through the loop, lifting it up. “You didn’t hear my proposal?” He asked, pursing his lower lip out in a pout. “I worked hard on that.”

Jemma shook her head slowly, remembering the conversations they’d had about it before, conversations that he’d never remember as long as they lived. But maybe that was okay. He’d never given her the opportunity to share his proposal with her, though they hadn’t had much time. The world ending and all that.

She tipped her head up to his, offering him a small smile. “Why don’t you tell me about it?”

And so he did.


End file.
